The
first
known mention of the name de Pagham was John de Pagham, the bishop of
Worcester
in the 1150’s.He was probably a native
of the township of Pagham on the Sussex coast.But the main de Pagham line of interest seems to have been a
family that had established itself as barons at York in the north of
England.

The story goes that Hugo de Pagham of this
family was
entrusted by King Henry III in 1257 with an important mission to the
King of
Spain.It was
considered a mark of great distinction
that Hugo should have been chosen for this mission as in those feudal
times
great discretion and care were required on the part of messengers and
ambassadors. King Henry was so much pleased with his diplomacy
and
faithful performance of this service, his mission having proven quite
successful, that he was made a knight in 1260.

In addition a proclamation was issued, giving notice that he was
thereafter to be known as Sir Hugo Page.From that time on, Page was adopted as the family name.

William de Pagham,
brother
of Hugo, was granted letters by Henry III to enable him to become a
commander
of the Crusaders in 1270.He accordingly
went to Palestine in command of a portion of the forces which engaged
in the
Holy Wars. He was one of the survivors of that expedition.After enduring four years of peril and
suffering, he returned and settled in Sussex in the southern part of
England.This de Pagham may have been the
progenitor of
some
Pages in this part of England.

The Page Estate in Middlesex

The
Page estate in Middlesex began at the time of
the dissolution of the monasteries when Henry VIII made available to
Page
families in and around the town of Harrow.At that time
this was a rather rough
country, part of it being covered by forests.It was not supposed to be of that much value.

The first part of these lands made available were
those held by the Knights of St. John surrounding Kilburn Priory.Here the nuns first had to be ejected.A local legend has it that the evicted nuns
foretold that those who succeeded them in the property would reach the
climax
of ambition and then disappear.Sir
Richard Page added the parish of Wembley in 1542.

The Page family held title to these lands
through the centuries.Litigants later
claimed
that the Page estate had expanded to include such historic sites as
Harrow
School, Sudbury Rectory, Wembley Park, and Twyford Abbey, as well as
some rich
agricultural districts towards the Berkshire and Hertfordshire borders.However, others maintained that the Page
estate had been much diminished over the years.

By the early 19th century the Page estate was in the hands of four
brothers who died in turn, the last being Henry Page in 1829, leaving
no heirs.

But claimants to what was seen as the Page
fortunes did appear.The most persistent
was from the descendants of a Henry Page from Hillingdon whose sons had
emigrated to Australia in 1850. In 1912
this family claim reached the high courts in London.However, the claim was dismissed by the
judge, primarily due
to the fact that Henry Page having died over eighty years ago and that
no legal case
could now be proved.

Samuel Page of
Lunenburg, Massachusetts

Samuel
Page had been born in Groton, Massachusetts in
1672 and at an early age departed for South Carolina.His first wife died there and he met his second wife
there. However, he did not remain there.He
returned to Massachusetts in 1718 and to
Lunenburg, then called Turkey Hills and some eight miles west of Groton.

It
was still a wilderness there.Samuel Page
was its first settler.The township
developed and he was usually called “Governor Page” since he was
presumed to be running
the place.

He
married his third wife in July 1747.But
he died two months later.The
inscription on his gravestone, executed in
rude capitals, read as follows:

“Here
lies buried the body of Mr. Samuel Page.
He
was the first that settled in this town,
Who departed this life Sept. 7, 1747In the 76th year of his age."

The Page Family's Rosewell Estate

Mann
Page was the grandson of immigrant John Page
and, at an early age, the sole heir of his grandfather’s vast estates
in
Gloucester county, Virginia.In 1725 he
constructed the family home, Rosewell House, at the junction of Carter
creek
and the York river, supposedly on the site where Pocahontas had saved
the life
of Captain John Smith.It was the
largest and finest residence in Virginia at that time and was built of
brick,
marble and carved mahogany.

Rosewell
was to be the ancestral home of the Page family for more than 100 years
- until
its eventual sale in 1838.John Page,
grandson of the builder, was the best friend and cousin of Thomas
Jefferson.Tradition has it that the
Declaration of
Independence was drafted in this house by Jefferson before he went to
Philadelphia.

Legends
and lore associated with the estate have abounded.Supposedly Mann Page had expired in the grand
front hall of the mansion and the Bishop of Virginia proclaimed that
God had
struck him down for his excesses.Another rumor was that Mann had died because he was cursed by
the spirit
of Powhatan for building the mansion on the site of Werewocomoco, the
chief’s
village.

In
1916 a fire swept through the mansion, gutting it and leaving only a
shell which remained as a haunting testament to 18th century
craftsmanship and
dreams.These ruins are haunted.Tales of hauntings on the Rosewell grounds
have
covered a broad spectrum, from full-body apparitions to moans.Vintage automobiles have even been sighted.

Thomas Nelson Page and the Myth of the Old South

When
Thomas
Nelson Page wrote about the antebellum South, he recalled his youth on
a
slaveholding Virginia Tidewater plantation.The descendant of generals, governors, and plantation owners, he
had
come to believe that the true South was populated by noble gentlemen,
pure
ladies, and devoted servants.

Page was only eleven years old when the Civil War
ended.Accustomed to aristocratic
superiority over blacks and non-elite whites, he found the postbellum
struggle
of his people jarring.He also believed
that Northerners had presented a distorted view of the South’s history
and
people - meaning the people of his own class.

He subscribed to the “Lost Cause” image
of the Civil War, extolling the virtues of Southern heroes’ brave fight
despite
inevitable doom at the hands of an industrial machine.As the honorable Confederatesoldiers
returned home,
they faced further challenges from Northern politicians and reformers
who made
policies based on ignorance of the true relationship between master and
slave.He praised the South’s better
people for courageously counteracting Reconstruction’s abuses to
restore their
values.He supported organizations such
as the Ku Klux Klanfor
their attempts to restore the proper social
order.

Through an impressive bibliography of short stories, poems, novels, and
essays, Page set about to correct this tarnished image. His
sentimental
idealizations of the Old South’s plantation culture contributed to the
development of a “moonlight and magnolias” myth that other writers at
the turn
of the century would perpetuate.

Frank Page of Cary, North Carolina

His
great grandfather Edward Page had come to a wild
and hitherto untamed region of North Carolina, seeking more freedom and
an
escape from the controlled life of the Virginia colony.

Allison Francis Page, born in Wake county in
1824, had the same independent pioneering streak.This
led him into the virgin forests of North
Carolina in order to harvest naval storesand
to operate lumbering outfits.He
realized much wealth from his logging operations, rafting the timbers
down the
Cape Fear riverto
Fayetteville,
his headquarters, and to Wilmington, an important port of the Carolinas.

Of
tremendous physique, Frank possessed the immense strength and endurance
that
was typical of his rugged Page breed. He was an energetic builder
and developer
with an adventuresome nature.Of a keen
intellect, intensely religious, and a staunch prohibitionist, he was
admired
for his candid, just, and uncompromising opinions rendered freely in
situations
where others might not dare to speak up.

He became the first mayor and
postmaster of Cary, a small village about twelve miles west of Raleigh.His home there was known as Pages
and was distinguished in its
architecture.The lumber used to build
the two-story frame structure of the Cary school was also prepared at
his
mill.And in 1868 he built a
Second-Empire hotel in the town, later known as the Page-Walker Hotel.

Because
he was such a great benefactor of the town, many of the citizens wished
to name
it Page's Station.But he insisted that
it be called Cary in honor of a prohibitionist that he greatly admired.

Frank
and his wife Catherine raised seven sons who all went onto distinguish
themselves:

Walter
Hines Pagewas
a brilliant scholar, noted editor, and respected U.S. ambassador to
Britain in
the Woodrow Wilson administration

Robert
Newton Page was an eminent legislator,
congressman, and banker

Henry Allison
Page was the U.S. food commissioner under Herbert Hoover during World
War One

Junius
(Chris) Raboteau Page became a
prominent businessman and benefactor of the nearby town of Aberdeen

John
W. Page
was a distinguished physician

Jesse
Page became a prominent clergyman of the
Methodist Episcopal Church

and Frank
Page was the founder and executive vice-president of Wachovia Bank in
Raleigh
and later chairman of the North Carolina Highway Commission.